The Social Media Generation

Today's generation is a generation of social media.  And if you have any hopes of reaching the teen and young adult crowd with advertising, you better keep this in mind.  Information, education, news, and other data is obtained through electronic media.  And social media is distinctly different from industrial or traditional media such as newspapers, television and film.  Social media is relatively inexpensive.  And most important is that it is easily accessible and anyone, who is familiar with social media is able to publish or access information.  I can not begin to guess the amount of time this generation spends on social media.

Of course the first think that comes to mind are the things my generation has been able to master.  Email, instant messaging, and texting were the beginnings of social media.  And then it got more complicated.

First there was My Space and then came Facebook.  It is positively mind boggling when you think of the number of people using Facebook.  I would think that if you wanted to advertise something and reach the greatest youth population, you need go no further than Facebook.  The amount of time my own children spend on Facebook is mind boggling and they are actually mild compared to other kids.  Fortunately they do have jobs, and outside interests that keep them from sitting all day at the computer.  And just when you think you might have Facebook figured out, they change and "improve" with things such as a timeline and custom facebook pages.  And there's more social media...

We have Twitter and Bebo.  There are blogs and microblogs.  Some of these I have heard of and others I have absolutely no idea what they are about or how they work.  But I don't feel so bad.  I am happy to be a part of my own generation where we actually talk to people in person and I only "follow" those I truly care about... family and friends.

This is a sponsored post for OrangeSoda, however, all the points and views are my own.